


Deeply Surprising

by Emerald Embers (emeraldembers)



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: M/M, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-05
Updated: 2010-04-05
Packaged: 2017-10-08 17:46:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/77977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emeraldembers/pseuds/Emerald%20Embers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the prompt: "Sephiroth/Zack; A change in plans can be a good thing."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Deeply Surprising

Zack was smiling when Sephiroth found him. This wasn't exactly a strange occurrence, though the General did have to wonder what could be so interesting about Junon. Everyone from top-ranking officials to new recruits frequently disgraced themselves on account of sheer boredom in the place, and while Sephiroth wasn't familiar with boredom, he was observant enough to recognise it in others. Zack was either far from bored, or an appallingly good actor. "Am I missing something?"

The dark-haired boy patted the space next to him, but Sephiroth decided he would rather stand than sit with his legs swinging off the edge of the concrete structure. It wasn't appropriate, and would look even less dignified than Zack's pose given the extra length of his legs compared with the boy's. "Not yet - you know what's going on today, right General?" A wink with the last word, as ever when off duty. "'Course you do. There's a boat due in any minute from Costa del Sol. I'm ready to do some girl-watching."

Once upon a time Sephiroth would have raised an eyebrow, maybe both eyebrows at the peculiarities of conversation with Zack, but familiarity had mostly worn him down to a quiet sigh and shake of the head. "Girl-watching?"

"I'm done with guy-watching, I've got you. But there's something about a pretty face and perky voice, isn't there?"

Sephiroth had also learnt long ago to avoid answering Zack's questions whenever possible. Besides, the dark-haired boy had baited him with a compliment. "Can I assume girl-watching is literally the practise of watching girls?"

"Damn right. Although once in a while it's also stage one of coming to the rescue." Zack's face crinkled into a small grimace. "Some guys don't stop at watching. It's creepy."

Sephiroth caught himself himself smiling at Zack's word choice before tapping him on the shoulder. "I'm afraid today's February 29th."

Zack's expression showed cogs ticking, but no full recognition, so Sephiroth elaborated. "February 29th being a leap year date, and therefore ignored by the Shinra calendar. Your boat of beautiful women is due this time tomorrow."

"Blow me," Zack huffed, looking despondently at the dock for a moment before shrugging and getting to his feet, scratching the back of his neck. "I know a pretty decent place to chill out though. You coming?"

Sephiroth opened his mouth to explain that he had pressing paperwork he ought to get back to, but found the protest cut off by Zack giving his 'Don't make me get demanding' look. Normally he would be loathe to do so, but Sephiroth allowed himself a quiet sigh before playing the role of the obedient friend and following after the brunette.

.

"... This is your 'chill out' zone?" There was, admittedly, something slightly hypnotic about the floating dock, but it didn't make the choice of location any less strange. Amongst other things, it wasn't remotely quiet.

"I love it. It's been pretty much abandoned since the water got messed up, but it's not far out enough to get all creepy-quiet." Loss of several buoys through the dock's lack of maintenance meant as soon as Zack stepped onto the dock it sank a little beneath the surface of the water, but being off-duty had led him to switch his boots for sandals, so it didn't matter too much.

"I would have thought silence necessary to relax."

Zack ran a hand through his hair, and Sephiroth marvelled at how Zack's hair didn't seem to get either more or less wild.

"Maybe for a normal person, but I've kinda lived in noisy places all my life. Most places in Gongaga don't have sound insulation. I'd be too weirded out by quiet to relax."

It seemed a fair enough observation. Sephiroth remembered being younger, finding silence in Hojo's laboratories just made him all the more apprehensive of when footsteps finally sounded.

Somewhere, distantly, an alarm went off.

"Ditch your boots and come up here," Zack insisted, the white surface of the dock making the unnatural blue shade of the water covering it all the more apparent.

"I think I may be too old for that," Sephiroth replied, knowing better than to tell Zack his concerns about the water and give the boy baiting material.

Zack's expression was incredulent. "You've got to be kidding me. You're ten years older than me _tops_!" Sephiroth cocked his head, his own way of making it clear he wasn't going to be swayed anytime soon. "Pfft, you know what it is, don't you? I know what it is. You've been hanging around the Prez too mu-"

Sephiroth would have commented on Zack's insubordinate remark had the natural world not made a much more effective rebuke by sending a rush of noise that left the brunette gulping and muttering "uh oh" under his breath before a decidedly large wave swept through the area and knocked him off his perch.

Sephiroth looked down as the last of the tide licked at his boots, took two steps backwards before looking around and finding a decidedly frightened looking Soldier clinging to the plastic insulation at the base of one of the electrical towers. "Help?"

"I'm considering it," Sephiroth replied, before allowing himself a small sigh and stripping off his boots and coat so they would not be drenched when he waded out into the water. "You're lucky you weren't killed." Peeling Zack away from the material that had saved him from some very, very nasty burns proved a little more difficult than expected given the brunette's death-grip on it, but as soon as he'd been separated from the tower Zack seemed quite content to play the rescued damsel in distress, flinging both arms around Sephiroth's neck. It took near all the self-control Sephiroth could muster to stop himself taking advantage of the situation and dunking the boy.

"You know what I want? Towels and a shower."

"And your mother?" Sephiroth asked, depositing the soldier on the beach, if one could call it that.

"I'll have you know I'm a big boy," Zack stuck his tongue out before making a face at the chemical taste the tainted water had left on his lips. "You'll need one too, that water's probably burning holes in your skin."

"Thank you for the warning," Sephiroth replied with a decidedly unimpressed tone, picking his boots and coat back up but leaving them off in case the water did any damage to them.

.

"Figures we'd be stuck in headquarters on our day off," Zack grumbled loudly over the din of the showers, seemingly incapable of silence even under these circumstances. That said, in between towelling himself off Sephiroth had to admit the boy was being calmer than after a covert operation - whenever Zack had to sneak in somewhere before unleashing mako-driven hell he always returned with a bout of verbal diarrhoea that could drive saints mad.

Zack left the shower, glanced over the General's naked body for one brief second before walking back into the cubicle to emerge moments later with a soaked towel covering his modesty.

Sephiroth narrowed his eyes. "_Zachary_. If you do what you're clearly thinking of doing -" The snap came anyway, and the silver-haired man used every last inch of will to stop himself clutching his soon to bruise behind and instead focus on catching his injurer before an escape could be made. It wasn't hard, given Zack had doubled over with laughter and made no protest or struggle when Sephiroth grabbed him by the shoulders and shoved him up against the lockers. "I gave you an order."

"Only half," Zack reminded with a grin before looking at his arms where they had been pinned against the lockers. "Day off anyway, else I could say something about unprovoked assault on a subordinate and get you another month's paperwork."

Sephiroth wasn't quite used to anger, pale skin flushing with impotent fury and his eloquence stolen away. "Unprovoked? You _damned_ -"

Zack laughed again before bringing his knee up between Sephiroth's legs and nudging against the General's length. "I was _kidding_. You're way too hard to seduce."

Masterfully ignoring the very dangerous but pleasurable presence of Zack's knee, Sephiroth replied, "I am not here for you to tease."

"Then why aren't you letting me go?" Zack asked, shoving his knee forward slightly to spread the General's legs a little further. "Let me know if you don't like it." Sephiroth bit his tongue but couldn't ignore his body's opinion of Zack's proximity any further, stirring to full arousal at the insistent rubbing. "God, you're a daft, beautiful bastard. Do you want this?"

"What?" Sephiroth asked in near disbelief, thinking the whole situation made things pretty damned obvious.

"I'm not molesting you if you say no. Do you want this?"

"Yes, damnit, do I have to spell it out?"

"Yes is good enough," Zack replied, grinning as he resumed rubbing his thigh against the General's erection. "It'd be easier if you let go."

"You're doing fine as you are," Sephiroth replied, becoming distinctly wary of Zack as a fiendish glint sparked in the boy's eyes.

"Yes sir," He replied, much to Sephiroth's confusion, keeping his pace slow, steady, and thoroughly maddening until the General pulled away.

"Lock the main door and lie down," Sephiroth ordered before picking his towel back up and wrapping it around his waist, walking through the side door to the public toilets. It didn't take long to find one of the free contraception sets Shinra had started distributing to try and stem the tide of employees getting into trouble with locals, and he returned to find Zack spread invitingly across the tiled floor, locked the door behind himself to prevent intruders. "You're lucky there are enough depraved Soldiers like you to warrant these," He commented wryly before removing his towel and kneeling at Zack's side, opening up the pack and handing a condom to the brunette whilst fiddling with a packet of lube.

Zack looked confused and awkward for a moment before he prompted, "Er... sir? Normally the guy on top wears the -" Sephiroth shot a look and there was another moment of confusion before the General slid two lubricated fingers inside himself and realisation rapidly dawned. "Oh my God."

"I never expected to see you surprised." Sephiroth took advantage of his manual dexterity, using his free hand to squeeze the last of the lube out of the packet onto Zack's erection before rubbing it over the aroused flesh properly. "Say yes if you want it."

"Hell yes!"

"Hell yes what, Zachary?"

The brunette paused for a moment before he caught on, grinning and replying, "Hell yes sir!"

Sephiroth nodded before kneeling over the boy's lap, freeing both his hands and using them to guide Zack inside.

Up until this point Zack had mostly looked shocked, but that expression seemed suddenly to have changed to 'actually having a heart attack'. It hurt to move, skin stretched to a point just short of tearing, but he couldn't complain with that face to look down at. Given the age, height and rank differences between them it was no surprise Zack expected to be in the reverse of this position, and how could he ever have assumed Sephiroth's preferences correctly? Friend or not, no one knew him well enough to make educated guesses. "Enjoying yourself?"

"Mmn," Replied the younger soldier, unable to resist arching up when Sephiroth tensed around him. "God!"

"Just Sephiroth." The General shrugged his shoulders twice to help relax his spine before lowering himself fully onto Zack, enjoying how the boy's slim hips felt between his thighs. It hadn't been too long since he'd last exerted himself in this particular way, but it wasn't very often that sex felt like fun; too many of his lovers, past and present, had decided sex needed to be taken seriously. It spoilt the act, in a way - if he'd wanted sex to feel like work he'd have taken up prostitution, or agreed to a political marriage. "This takes two, Zack," he prompted, uninterested in taking charge and wanting the brunette to remember who had initially been the seducer.

Zack seemed to return to reality somewhat, letting out a quick breath before gripping Sephiroth's hips and thrusting up, not setting a pace yet but testing as if he were half afraid that getting this wrong would lead to his death and/or demotion. Neither option was particularly appealing. "Zack, I'm not going to break," He said in a warning tone, waiting for the brunette to get the hint, and had to laugh when Zack grunted and flipped him over so that he could be on top instead.

"Seph, you know I think the world of you, but if you don't stop giving me orders..."

"You'll what?" Sephiroth challenged, moaning aloud when the brunette thrust violently into him. "Can't -" Another, "Complain -" Another, "At that -" And he was quiet this time, using one arm to make sure his head didn't bang against the wall and the other to grasp at the floor as if it would bunch in his hands like a bedsheet, something to grip for security against the madness of hormones and adrenaline as Zack seemed to downright _test_ the theory that he wasn't about to break. Realising that his lover had no intentions of easing the pace or freeing his hands to help out given they were the only source of balance he really had, Sephiroth took the matter of his own satisfaction into his own hands in a very literal way, watching Zack's expression move through angry lust into slight guilt, then into a more comfortable lust as the realisation dawned that his General did actually want to be treated this way.

"You do like it rough," Zack said, breathless and sweating with exertion, and Sephiroth was reminded of the fact that for all his cocksure attitude and killing ability, the brunette was still young, and sweet with it.

"I'm not fragile," He replied, felt the pace grow unsteady and slightly slackened as Zack neared orgasm, and he linked both legs around the brunette's waist to draw him in further. "I won't break."

It was a repeated statement but it seemed to be what Zack needed, pushing in deep and hard as he came, and pulling out carefully before disposing of the condom in a nearby bin, throwing the discarded lube packet in after it. "Seph..."

"Later, Zack." Sephiroth smirked before wincing as he got up, walking back into one of the shower cubicles and pulling the soldier in with him. "You've got work to finish and a mess to clean up."

Zack didn't protest.

.

The evening wore on, the day seeming pleasantly uneventful after leaving the showers, dinner at somewhere half-decent and finding a reasonably legal card game filling the hours that didn't pass with ease before they parted ways and headed for their individual quarters. The fact Zack made no attempt to ask if what had passed between them was a one-off was a relief from the usual awkwardness or clinginess Sephiroth was used to, and made it that much likelier that he would consider repeat performances. If anyone had been trusted to know about the encounter and had thought to ask, Sephiroth couldn't have said what made him choose Zack, especially given his normal choices tended to be his own age and similar in rank, but he had a few ideas. The boy had never been sycophantic around him and had an intoxicating easy confidence in almost everything he did. Whatever else might be behind the decision, he liked Zack.

It felt like a promising start to this development in their relationship at least, and while it had never been an issue worth worrying about, Sephiroth could not help noticing that rest seemed to come easier to him than it ever did normally. Cotton sheets seemed cool but comfortably so against his clean skin, the room neutral in scent and colour and allowing him to remember the day's events with clarity from the smells and tastes that lingered on and inside his body, his mind calm rather than gathering every detail about his surroundings as it normally did. Zack had not left him with a kiss, but a hug, and every last inch of it had felt _right_.

Sephiroth slept easily that night.


End file.
